For the purpose of the present invention to be described herein below, it should be noted that
a network node/managing node may for example be any kind of communication station, such as wireless or wired stations, e.g. base stations, base transceiver stations, personal computers, or the like, irrespective of a specific standard to which these conform as long as they are compatible with the communication network, such as Global System for Mobile Communication (GSM), Universal Mobile Telecommunication System (UMTS), IS-95, Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access (WiMAX) or the like;                for the communication network any suitable protocol for operating/message exchange is possible; only as an example it is noted that IP (internet protocol) based networks are particularly suitable to be used with the present invention;        method steps or actions performed in connection with the method, likely to be implemented as software code portions and being run using a processor at one of the network node/managing node entities, are software code independent and can be specified using any known or future developed programming language as long as the functionality defined by the method steps or actions is preserved;        generally, any method step is suitable to be implemented as software or by hardware without changing the idea of the present invention in terms of the functionality implemented;        method steps and/or devices likely to be implemented as hardware components at one of the network node/managing node entities are hardware independent and can be implemented using any known or future developed hardware technology or any hybrids of these, such as MOS (Metal Oxide Semiconductor), CMOS (Complementary MOS), BiCMOS (Bipolar CMOS), ECL (Emitter Coupled Logic), TTL (Transistor Transistor Logic), etc., using for example ASIC (Application Specific Integrated Circuit) components or DSP (Digital Signal Processor) components, as an example;        devices can be implemented as individual devices, but this does not exclude that they are implemented in a distributed fashion throughout the system, as long as the functionality of the device/system is preserved;        respective elements, e.g. transceiver, generator, setting unit etc. according to embodiments can be implemented by any known means, either in hardware (e.g. using DSP, microprocessor, microcontroller, ASIC, field programmable gate array (FPGA), AD- and DA-converters, power amplifiers, filters, antennas etc) and/or software, respectively, as long as it is adapted to perform the described functions of the respective parts.        
Due to an increasing data load that is communicated in communication networks and/or an increasing number of subscribers in a communication network, it is sometimes necessary to add new network nodes to an existing communication network in order to be able to handle the data load and to serve all subscribers. After the mechanical installation of a new network node, like e.g. a base station, a site visit of skilled personnel is needed to commission the base station. A network node is considered to be commissioned if the network node has been configured initially to perform according to its required operation in the network. For remote commissioning a network protocol address must be allocated to the network node, so that the network node can be directly addressed by the managing node by means of the allocated network protocol address. In order to be able to address the network node, the managing node must know the network protocol address of the network node. This is called advertising a new network node to the managing node and can be done for example by setting the known network protocol address of the new network node to the managing node. In other words, a network node is considered to be advertised to the managing node when the managing node is aware about the network protocol address of the network node, has created a binding between the network protocol address and the network node and can thereafter address the network node via this network protocol address. Zone Name: A1,AMD
According to a known method, network protocol addresses of network nodes are planned in advance and then set to the managing node (e.g. manually or by importing of network planning data) and to the network node. Setting the network protocol address to the network node must be done during a site visit locally (usually together with other configuration parameters). However, such site visits require highly skilled personnel and are time consuming, therefore expensive for the network operator.
According to a known method, network protocol addresses of network nodes are planned in advance and then set to the managing node (e.g. manually or by importing of network planning data) and to the network node. Setting the network protocol address to the network node must be done during a site visit locally (usually together with other configuration parameters). However, such site visits require highly skilled personal and are time consuming, therefore expensive for the network operator.
Currently, there exist several general mechanisms how to enable a network node, like e.g. the base station, to get a network protocol address (e.g. IP address) automatically, like for example the dynamic host configuration protocol (DHCP). However, although a network node can get a network protocol address automatically, the managing node is still not aware about the network protocol address and the position of the network node where it belongs to and can not address the network node directly by its network protocol address.
The same applies also to newly rolled-out networks.